Short of cover-mounting Ritalin on the matchday programme, what is to be done about the worrying attention deficit in some of our most precious football fans? That some Aston Villa supporters waited a full 45 minutes into the new season to boo their team and manager off the pitch is commendable.

Scientific research fabricated for the purposes of this column suggests that in 1965, sections of a Scottish football crowd committed suicide in the ground before a ball had even been kicked, apparently believing it would save time. I say inside the ground, but in fact the ground itself had not even been built, and consisted merely of a single council planning notice nailed to a post. But we all know how these things turn out, don't we?

Well of course we do. All across the country, right now, are people who have built season simulation models that are accurate to within an infinitesimal margin of error. Not only can they tell you that Liverpool's season is completely over, but they can even forecast the precise flapping of, say, Mark Hughes's wings that will result in a tsunami of trophies come May.

As with many such thrilling technological advances, though, the enhanced knowledge has not made us universally happy. Do consider those unnumbered Villa fans, baying for blood or Adderall or something at half-time against Wigan. It becomes difficult to avoid the conclusion that we are raising a generation of embarrassingly impatient idiots – of premature gesticulators, if you will.

Surely such fans should pace themselves. Or can they somehow sustain their frothing, essentially impotent rage for the duration of a season, digging deep to provide that extra final burst of mad fury should they indeed not better last year's sixth place?

If Villa's manager, Martin O'Neill, did indeed decline to wave to his supporters during Monday's win over Liverpool, as some have speculated, then he probably believes in the tough love school of behavioural therapy. But there will be bleeding-heart liberals who wish to be more understanding of why some people are acting like such spanners. They are advised that it is becoming traditional to blame The X Factor.

When Steve McClaren was at the nadir of his powers, and the abuse from England fans at its most rabid, Sir Alex Ferguson cited the "mocking culture" exemplified by such programmes. "You see it on all these TV shows where the panellists criticise the contestants," he said. "There's a mocking industry now and it's even generated by television programmes. Even when they skate, the panel then criticises them ... When they [football supporters] see that [on television], they mock the manager, they ridicule him."

And for all that I yield to no one in my veneration of Simon Cowell, Sir Ferg might be on to something. The fact of "reality" shows such as The X Factor is that they misrepresent reality, only showing the great and the rubbish, and pretending that constitutes the whole. Perhaps it has become necessary to observe that sport is real, so you are going to get mediocrity – a lot. Sport requires patience and respect, not script editing and snap judgments, and Martin O'Neill deserves respect just as Ricky Ponting does, because respect is a function of long-term appreciation and understanding. Even if Rafael Benítez is fantastically irksome.

Elsewhere, fans have justified their short fuses with the bizarre logic that the cost of season tickets means it is not unreasonable to pelt These Pampered Prima Donnas™ with abuse from the word go, on the basis that they've paid for the privilege. Is that really what they've paid for?

If I might overshare for a moment, this argument always makes me think of a punter who believes the fact they have hired a prostitute means they can do almost literally anything they like to her. (Or indeed to him – might be a chap, after all.)

As for the tedious gloaters who write off seasons in August, they can be bracketed with those people who sit three rows in front of your seats and always, without fail, leave five minutes before time to beat the traffic. Oh sure, they've missed plenty of historically thrilling late goals down the years. But they have their foresight, you see, and nothing is more valuable than that.

And yet, is it? For the self-respect of our national game, perhaps we might consider encouraging slightly more edifying behaviour, and that naturally includes any hacks stoking it all. At this rate, even in the hitherto ill-regarded gnat leagues, there will be insects buzzing out of their grounds with a greater capacity for patience.